Get ready to vote with ballots, polling places and absentee ballots by
clicking here:
Join the official discussion board of your questions to the candidates,
and more. Sound off by clicking here:
For young adult policy issues, including polling data, fact sheets and
in-depth policy analysis, click here:
The Lighter Side of Election, Care of Candidate Zero
Click here to see if you've got the skills to be President - you know,
the lightenin' quick arrow keys and the fearless ability to collect votes
by eating stars in a maze while dodging voracious cartoon Democrats and
Republicans. If you first collect a ticket, button, picket, or cup of
coffee then you can win 50 votes by swaying each Democrat or Republican
in your favor - AKA eating them Pac-Man-style. (Ms. Pac-Man-style for
the ladies.) The game's wahka-wahka-wahka sound is worth it alone.
Nonpartisan Parody: CANDIDATE ZERO is a one-platform pol who knows how
to bond with potential voters ("I've always wanted to try yoga";
"Tiramisu is never as good as you think it's going to be").
He's got his own bio ("I invented the after-hours party") and
his own mockumentary clips from the mock campaign trail where he mockingly
mocks about himself and our "beautiful land of freedom, where woodchucks
can chuck and the deer can do...whatever it is that deer like to do."
Added bonus: Real footage of a hopping monkey. It's a monkey. But it's
hopping.
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Archive: Presidential Youth Debate 2004
Why a Presidential Youth Debate?
Why? Because we like you. And then there's this: There are 24 million young
Americans in this country. That is a lot of us. Even so, it makes sense
that the campaign ads and what goes on in Washington are so targeted to
older voters. They vote. In fact, in the 2000 election 36% of people
our age voted and 70% of older voters turned out on Election Day. So we
here at The New Voters Project - the largest grassroots youth voter
mobilization campaign in history - decided to do something about it.
Our plan has a few somethings, actually: [Read More] NONPARTISANSHIP:
From marketing only through strictly nonpartisan media outlets, to
creating an evenly split pre-moderating panel of individuals and a
nonpartisan moderating panel, we exhaustively committed ourselves to
keeping true to our nonpartisanship. You can click here to learn more about the vigilantly nonpartisan process we used to reach millions of young Americans and ultimately enable them to ask and choose these final questions for the candidates.
PREVIOUSLY UNANSWERED QUESTIONS ONLY:
The final questions don't include all of the many concerns that are
important to young Americans. Indeed, we were inundated with questions
that had been repeatedly answered by the candidates but rarely get
air-time in the traditional debates. After you've viewed the responses
to these top 12 previously unanswered questions, don't forget to also check out the answers to those other common questions from young Americans by clicking here.
Debate Schedule and Moderating Panel
Following is a schedule of how the debate works:
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Thu., 9/16
- The Presidential Youth Debate began and we started collecting debate
questions from 13-35 year olds nationwide. We received over 5,100 in
total, with over 4,300 of those coming in the final four days alone.
- Mon., 9/27 - 4 p.m. EST, we stopped accepting questions. - Moderating panel organizations,
along with our lead moderator Farai Chideya, received the top 50
questions and nominated their top 20 from 18-35 year olds and their top
5 from 13-17 year-old "Future Voters." [Read more about our vigilantly nonpartisan moderating process.]
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Tue., 9/28 - Nominations were tallied.
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Wed., 9/29
- Top 20 questions were posted to this site for 18-35 year olds to
choose the 10 they most want answered by President Bush, Senator Kerry
and Mr. Nader, and the top 5 from 13-17 year olds were posted so these
Future Voters can choose their greatest concern.
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Tue., 10/5 - Question voting ended at noon (EST)
- Along with one question from our lead moderator Farai Chideya, we
sent the candidates the 12 previously unanswered questions that most
concern young Americans, and requested well thought-out, accurate
answers returned from them within one week, as they've previously
agreed to do.
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Tue., 10/13 - The candidates' responses were posted to site, and they were given one week to add their rebuttals of 500 words or less.
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Tue., 10/20
- Rebuttals were added to the original responses, finally giving young
Americans the unique answers they need to vote for the future they
want. Americans of all ages will also have their last pre-Election look
at how the top candidates responded to the same previously unanswered
questions.
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Tue., 11/2 - Voters elected a President.
Narrowing down all of the great questions submitted by our nation's youth is not an easy task. . . [Read More]
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On behalf of our nation's youth, we thank the following partners for helping us
spread the word:
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